Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks about Iran during a joint meeting of the United States Congress in the House chamber at the U.S. Capitol today. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet joined with several of his Senate colleagues on Tuesday for a private meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — the latest effort by the Colorado Democrat to show solidarity with Israel following his backing of a nuclear deal with Iran, which Netanyahu opposed.

That vote — and Bennet’s support of it — has prompted criticism from powerful lobbying groups as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. Bennet, who is up for re-election next year, has made several high-profile moves since the mid-September debate on the Iran deal to try and mend fences with Israeli allies at home and abroad.

With other Democratic lawmakers, he co-authored a bill that would send more aid to Israel — though no Republicans were part of its Oct. 1 unveiling. He also was one of several Democrats to send a letter to the White House this week urging President Barack Obama to do more for Israel’s defense, including missile defense funding.

[media-credit name=”Dan Balilty-Pool/Getty Images” align=”alignright” width=”270″][/media-credit] U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry shakes hands with Israel’s President Shimon Peres in the president’s residence today in Israel. Peres will soon be meeting with Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, who leaves today on a personal trip to Israel.

Gov. John Hickenlooper’s office announced he is departing today for Israel and will return to Colorado on April 17.

From the news release: “This is a personal trip initiated more than a year ago and planned for the past six months. The trip includes stops at various historic sites and a variety of events, as well as meetings with President Shimon Peres and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat. The governor is paying for all of his expenses; no public dollars are being used for the trip.”

No word yet on whether the governor will ask advice on gun control.

Lt. Gov. Joe Garcia will serve as acting governor while Hickenlooper is out of the country.

The Israeli ambassador to the United States spoke at a legislative reception this morning, then headed to the floors of the House and Senate, where both bodies passed a resolution recognizing close ties between Colorado and the largely Jewish Middle Eastern nation.

But the resolution did ruffle a few feathers.

Ambassador Michael Oren spoke to the public and to members of both houses before they convened. Oren said Coloradans and Israelis share a legacy as “frontier societies” whose early people faced many dangers.

While Coloradans are much safer today, Oren said Israel continues to face threats to its existence from hostile Arab nations who will not recognize Israel as a Jewish state, as well as the constant threat of terrorism.

“We face terror,” Oren told the assembled crowd on the first floor of the Capitol. “Terror every day.” Read more…

A Denver woman who is Palestinian says she can’t get a straight answer out of the Colorado Senate about its pro-Israeli resolution to be heard Friday.

Rima Sinclair said that within the space of 30 minutes Wednesday she was told that Sen. Joyce Foster, who is Jewish, and an unnamed rabbi were involved in writing the resolution, and then she was told that they were not involved.

Sinclair said she was also told that Jewish organizations were involved in drafting the resolution, and when she asked whether other organizations could be involved in crafting it she was told no outside groups had been involved.

“The Colorado Capitol isn’t the place to be dealing with foreign policies,” Sinclair said today. “And this is not the first time the legislature has done that. It is out of place.”

Republican U.S. Senate hopeful Jane Norton released a package of foreign policy positions today, backing it with an Internet ad buy attacking President Obama for going soft on terrorism.

Norton’s foreign policy paper, which her campaign said she would outline in a town hall forum tonight with Colorado Republicans, dings the Obama Administration for proposing to close the Guantanamo Bay prison holding alleged terrorists, and for wanting to bring those suspects to civilian trials on U.S. soil. Norton is also sharply critical of Obama’s handling of Israel, saying the administration has grown too critical of a key ally.

Norton’s web ad, supported with $15,000 in spending on prominent web sites, ridicules the administration for allegedly trying to rebrand the war on terror as an “overseas contingency operation.” It is true that Washington insiders earlier this year noticed the phrase creeping into official discussions of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, as this Washington Post article discusses. The article goes on, however, to quote administration officials who said there is no mandated name change or avoidance of the “war on terror” phrase.

The foreign paper questions whether there should be timetables for troop withdrawals from either Iraq or Afghanistan, saying those decisions should follow recommendations of military leaders on the ground. Obama has said withdrawals from Afghanistan could begin in July 2011, after a troop surge he pushed for has had time to stabilize the nation.

“Our immediate objective is clear: to resist the call for an expedient withdrawal and instead redouble our efforts in denying the Taliban a place to hide,” Norton said on Afghanistan.

She also said defense and intelligence officials should not be barred from using “enhanced interrogation techniques” on suspected terrorists, methods that many groups have labeled torture.

“What’s more, with American lives at stake, terrorists should not be read their Miranda rights,” her paper reads. “I fully support giving our intelligence community the tools they need to get the job done.” There was considerable disagreement even among conservatives on this point, notably after a man was arrested for allegedly leaving an explosives-packed vehicle in New York’s Times Square.

Norton’s paper also mentions international trade and Iran sanctions, among other points. Norton says that while other American presidents had passed important trade legislation by this time in their terms, the Obama Administration has let languish some preliminary agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea. She says the U.S. should impose tough trade sanctions on Iran for pursuing nuclear weapons, with or without U.N. approval.

Truth be told, I consistently misfire in my political (and other) predicitions. So I thought I would mention one prediction that I was, sadly, right about. While doing researching for a column I’m working on regarding the situation in the Middle East, I ran across a piece I wrote in 2002, right before free elections in Gaza, warning about the counterproductive nature of an “independent” Gaza.

Bush’s assertion that Palestinians should elect someone not “compromised” by terror is regretfully unrealistic. After decades of anti-Semitic propaganda and jihadist brainwashing, polls substantiate the uncivilized tenor of the general population in ´Palestinian territory´, which widely supports terror. In a recent poll, a majority of Palestinians said their goal was the elimination Israel, while only 43 percent support a Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza. The same polls showed that between 60 percent and more than 70 percent of Palestinians support suicide bombings. …

Has anybody made sure that the Palestinians have a choice?” Which adversary of Israel will guarantee that Palestinians actually have a “choice” this time? The EU? Jimmy Carter? Powell? Arafat? And what does a democracy guarantee anyway? The elected Iranian parliament makes the autocratic King of Jordan seem like Thomas Jefferson. Democracy on its own means nothing.

We are seeing the end result of a Hamas-ruled territory today. Democracy won’t work, and we can’t project it on others, simply because we value it so highly.

Joey Bunch has been a reporter for 28 years, including the last 12 at The Denver Post. For various newspapers he has covered the environment, water issues, politics, civil rights, sports and the casino industry.